"In the city of Benin," said the commander, that night at dinner, "and all around it, westward to Dahomey, Abomey, and Ashantee, they are a bad lot, an accursed lot, treacherous and cruel to a degree."
"I've heard it said," Creggan ventured to remark, "that the men of Benin are not brave, Captain Flint."
The captain shook his head and smiled.
"We must not believe all we hear. Remarks like these are generally made by gentlemen journalists who live at home at ease. But I've been there, lad, and found it altogether different."
The dinner passed off very comfortably indeed. Dr. Grant would not touch wine, but when dessert had been removed, and the commander ordered the steward to bring in the tumblers, he helped himself somewhat liberally to the wine of his native land.
"Well, Captain Flint," he said, "I haven't really been a dog's watch[1] in the service, as you might say, and with the exception of a brush with the Arabs on the East Coast of Africa, and north of the Equator, I've never seen what we in Scotland term 'solid fighting'."
[1] The dog-watches are from four to six and six to eight every evening, and therefore only two hours long, while all the others are four hours.
"I think you will have a chance now, doctor."
"Ay, sir; and I won't begrudge flailing around with the claymore a bit, and seeing my patients afterwards."
"Tell us something about Benin, sir, if you please," said Creggan.
"Well, lad, I've told you that the people are fearful savages when aroused, although seemingly quiet enough at all other times. Benin, you know, is really a country extending to Ashantee. Once exceedingly powerful, and densely populated still, it is now divided into many half-independent states.
"The city itself lies nearly eighty miles up the river Niger, from the Atlantic Ocean or Gulf of Guinea. It is about twenty miles inland. This river is miles wide where it joins the sea, and if you once get over the bar, it may be cautiously navigated by boats and launches nearly all the way up. But there is the dreaded bar to cross. What are those lines, lad, about Greenland's icy mountains?"
"Oh, I know," said Creggan, holding up one arm as if he were a school-boy.
"'From Greenland's icy mountains,
From India's coral strand;
Where Afric's sunny fountains
Roll down their golden sand.'
"Is there a lot of golden sand, sir?"
"There is a lot of constantly shifting black-brown mud, but if you expect to find gold or see it, you'll be sadly disappointed.
"The city itself contains from twelve to twenty thousand natives, as well as I could guess.
"The king is a savage emperor of the deepest and blackest dye. His reign is a reign of terror. He rules his unhappy subjects with rods of iron and knives of steel. I hope you'll never see what I have seen there. The sight of those human sacrifices, boy, would return to your dreams for years afterwards. They do to mine, whenever I am ill or troubled."
"You saw them, sir?"
"I was despatched on a mission of peace, one might say. I had a body-guard of fifty armed men, and blue-jackets and marines, and had need been, we could have fought our way to our boats through all the king's fanatics.
"The mission was this. You must know that all the coast-line is British, and the people at home were constantly being shocked to hear of the terrible human sacrifices occurring in Benin, while it was nothing uncommon to find a mutilated and headless corpse, that the sharks had spared, cast up with outspread arms on the beach."
"Terrible!" said Dr. Grant.
"Yes. And my mission was not to take revenge, but to endeavour pacifically to get the king to give up those massacres of men, women, and helpless children, for whom he had no more pity than the self-named sportsmen who follow the Queen's hounds have for the innocent and hunted stag.
"The king was amply supplied with bad rum or arrack, the worst and most fiery of all spirits. He got this stuff from the palm-oil traders of Gato, men who came from Portugal and even Britain itself.
"He was three sheets in the wind when we arrived on a beautiful afternoon. He told us, through our interpreter, how delighted he was to see us, and how he would give us a grand show next morning.
"We occupied portions of his grass-hut palace, keeping well together after lying down on grass mats, with our arms by our sides; for as the king had got drunker and drunker, and was now yelling and whooping like a madman, we feared he would make an attempt to murder us all before morning.
"You see, Creggan, that cutting throats was a fancy or fad of this brutal monarch's, just as collecting foreign stamps is with most English boys.
"All around the back part of the palace lay bleaching skulls and skeletons, that the blue-bottle flies and ants had polished, and recent corpses also, from which so fearful a stench arose and poisoned the air that we could scarcely sleep.
"But I fell off at last, and the sun was shining over the dense forests of the East before I awoke. Something was going on behind. Something dreadful, I felt sure. There was a low and pitiful moaning, but no cries. Yet every now and then came a dull thud, similar to that which a butcher makes in splitting a pig in two.
"I peeped through the back wattled wall. Oh, lad, may you never see such a sight!
"Over fifty poor creatures were huddled together mournfully awaiting their doom. Every half-minute one was dragged out, and stood with his or her hands between the knees and head bent down, till the cruel blow fell that severed that head from the body.
"But three or four were crucified in another corner.
"My remonstrances were in vain. The king only laughed, and told me that it was all got up in my honour.
"As no more could be done, we left almost immediately. We regaled ourselves on fruits as we passed on through the jungle to our sailor-guarded boat, and glad enough were we all when we found ourselves rowing once more down the beautiful river, on each bank of which—alive with beautiful birds—the foliage and trees were like the forests and woodlands of fairyland.
"But," continued the commander, "to change the subject to one more pleasant, tell us the story of your young life, my lad."
Nothing loath, Creggan told the doctor and him all he knew from his babyhood, and all about the hermit also.
"Why, it is a perfect romance, Creggan," said Flint.
"Indeed it is," said Grant. "I'll take more interest in the lad now than ever."
* * * * * * * * * * *
Arrived at the mouth of the Niger, they found the Centiped anchored outside the bar.
She was not going to venture across, being too large.
On the bar itself the breakers were dashing and curling house-high. There was just one gap in the centre, and through this the saucy Rattler must force her way.
Before proceeding she was lightened as much as possible, that is, all men not required were sent on board the cruiser.
Then "Go ahead at full speed", was the order.
The Rattler's full speed was nothing very extraordinary, but when she reached the gap at last and entered it, poor Creggan felt appalled. The roar of a seeming Niagara at each side was so terrible, that even through the speaking-trumpet scarcely could the skipper's voice be heard.
The roar was mingled with a seething, hissing sound, which was even more deafening than the thunder of the breakers itself.
She bumped her keel several times on the bottom, which here was hard, so violently that the men were thrown down, and Creggan began to say his prayers, thinking the ship must undoubtedly become a wreck. Nevertheless, in a minute or two they were into the deep smooth water inside the bar. Here she was anchored for a time, until all the marines and blue-jackets of both ships were got on board the Rattler. The boats and steam launch would accompany the expedition, and after all were loaded up with armed men, the advance was made up stream.
It was now about two bells in the forenoon watch, and they expected to get up as high as it was possible before night.
This it was found impossible to do, so she was anchored, and next day succeeded in reaching a station some forty miles from the sea, called Sapelé. This in launches, the gun-boat being left further down. Here to their joy they found a fort or barracks, containing in all about two hundred and fifty officers and men (soldiers).
The expeditionary force from the Rattler was soon landed and hailed with delight. Together they were now quite a strong little army.
The commanding officer told Captain[2] Flint a sickening story of the massacre of the traders.
[2] A Commander in the Royal Navy is not in reality a captain, but is usually addressed so by courtesy.
"The king, in fact," he said, "is jealous of the approach of the Protectorate."
After the murders he, the officer, had sent a sergeant with a flag of truce and several Kroomen, to ask for an interview with the tyrant.
Two days afterwards the white sergeant dragged himself, wounded and half-dead, into barracks. Before he expired, poor fellow, he had only time to report that every Krooman was murdered, and that Benin was in a state of terrible ferment, like a hive of hornets.
"And so, Captain Flint," he added, "between your force and mine, I think we can give this murderous assassin such a drubbing that he will not forget it for years."
"We'll do our best," said Flint; "and I suppose the sooner we start the better."
"Certainly; it is always wiser to attack than wait to be attacked."
So it was determined to give the little army a hearty supper, let them turn in early, and ready to start by three, inland now through the jungle, towards Benin. The real distance from Sapelé to Benin is, I believe, about twenty-five miles, but the road, if road it could be called, was bad enough in all conscience.
Nevertheless, it was determined to drag along two guns, with a good supply of shell. The bugle sounded prettily over woods and dells and river, shortly after two, and on finishing their hurried breakfast the force fell in.
Very proud indeed was Creggan to be allowed to go along with it, armed not only with a good cutlass, instead of the almost useless dirk, but with a revolver.
This was indeed a forced march, for before four o'clock next day they had got within twelve miles of the dismal city, with only one halt to partake of food, although much wood had to be cut down. They immediately hewed trees and bushes and went into laager, expecting an attack at any moment. When as safe as could be, fires were lit and supper cooked. Under other circumstances they would have remained silent and in the dark, but the commanding officer well knew that long before this time the blood-stained king would have heard of their advance. So, no attempt at concealment was necessary.
But the men were tired, so soon after supper fires were banked, and in an hour's time there was hardly a sound to be heard in the laager.
Dr. Grant and Creggan were the last to stretch themselves on their pallets of grass. Grant in his own wild Highland home had been used to roughing it, and Creggan, as we know, led a very active life on the Island of Wings. So neither felt tired.
The night was balmy with the odour of many gorgeous wild flowers, and it was even cool. The moon shone like a disc of gold, high up near the zenith, dimming even the effulgence of the brightest stars, and casting a strange, dreamy, phosphorescent light over the shapeless masses of cloud-like trees, and a brighter glimmer on the tall feathery cocoa-nut palms. Now and then away in the woods, there arose the mournful cry of some bird of prey, a cry that would make the marvellously beautiful king-fishers crouch lower to the perches on which they sat, and thrill their hearts with terror.
Now and then a fleecy, snow-white cloudlet would sail gently over the moon's disc, making the light scenery momentarily dimmer, but soon all was brightness once more. From an adjacent creek at times would come the sound of a heavy plunge, but whether from ghastly crocodile or hippopotamus they could not tell.
"It is indeed a goodly night," said Grant.
"Oh, it is heavenly!" cried Creggan; "but will we all be alive this time to-morrow?"
"Who can tell, my lad? No one dies till his day comes.
"But," he added with some hesitation, "you're not afraid, are you?"
"Oh, no indeed, doctor; just a little anxious, that is all. This will be my first fight, you know. But I am seventeen now—"
"Yes, and hard and strong, Creggan."
"So, doctor, if I get a chance to hit a nigger, I mean to hit him just as hard as I know how to."
"Very good. So shall I; but let me give you a word of good advice, because I'm older than you. Don't get carried away by excitement. He fights best who fights as calmly as possible. Keep to the fighting line or square, as the case may be, and you'll do well.
"And now I think I'll turn in, and may God in his mercy preserve us both to-morrow, and our Captain Flint as well."
"Amen!" said Creggan.
* * * * * * * * * * *
In less than half an hour after this Creggan was fast asleep, and dreaming that he was bounding over the smooth waves of the blue Minch in his skiff, with poor honest Oscar in the bows, and bonnie wee fair-haired Matty in the stern-sheets all smiles and dimples, her eyes twinkling with fun and merriment.
The dream seemed a very short one.
"Surely," he said, when the bugle sounded, "I cannot have slept an hour."
Yet it was already half-past one, and the moon had westered and was slowly sinking towards the horizon.
Before two breakfast was finished, a ration of rum served out, and the march resumed.
They must walk silently now.
The road was better, so that under the light of the stars only, for the moon had sunk, they had reached the wide straggling city by five o'clock.
Here the forces separated, the marines and blue-jackets lying in wait in a piece of jungle in the east; the soldiers making a silent detour to the back of the city, where was a dense primeval forest.
The guns were a long way behind, but just as the sun was tipping the glorious clouds of palms with its crimson rays, they were dragged in.
The sound of one gun and a bursting shell was to give notice to the soldiers hidden in the forest that the battle had indeed begun.
Just as the sun cast his bright beams across the darkling forest a buzz of awakening life began to arise from the city.
A spy had informed the naval commander where the king's forces, to the number of five thousand at least, were concentrated.
He now pointed out the very spot, a kind of fort and eminence in the centre of the town, and not far from the awful blood-stained palace.
"Now, gunner," cried Captain Flint cheerily, "give us the best shot ever you fired in your life."
"I'll do my level best," was the reply.
There was no quaver in the man's voice, no quiver in his hand.
The gun rang out in the morning air, echoed and re-echoed from forest and brae, and the shell was planted right in the centre of that heathen fort, bursting, and evidently doing tremendous damage. The battle had begun.